@oldfitz | 15 Magazines | 10,494 Articles | 22,303 Followers | 1 Like | An array of news and opinion pieces on matters being discussed in the public sphere. Opinions are not those of Keith Fitzgerald.

WASHINGTON — The shooting looked bad. But that is when the professor is at his best. A black motorist, pulled to the side of the road for a turn-signal violation, had stuffed his hand into his pocket. The white officer yelled for him to take it out. When the driver started to comply, the officer …

A congressional standoff over how to renew an expiring highway-funding bill pushed the Senate into a rare and heated Sunday session, but the legislative path forward remains unclear, leaving federal transportation projects hanging in the balance.

A federal judge has ruled that hundreds of immigrant women and children held in U.S. detention facilities should be released because their detention violates conditions of a 1997 court settlement that put restrictions on how migrant children are held.

If ministers are to “start work on plans to identify innovative efficiencies and reforms, delivering the remaining consolidation over the next four years” (Report, 21 July), can we suggest that the Home Office saves substantial costs by ending the inhumane and unjust practice of indefinite …

Transgender people are not getting adequate health care, and widespread discrimination is largely to blame, according to a recent World Health Organization report. And the story is told most starkly in the high rates of HIV among transgender women worldwide.

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, the term “Chicago boys” was originally used to refer to Latin American economists, trained at the University of Chicago, who took radical free-market ideology back to their home countries. The influence of these …

Medical cannabis, recreational cannabis; it's getting hard to tell the two apart -- even in states where only the former is allowed. Just look at your local dispensary. If it's anything like my local weed shop, your cannabis choices are governed more by the brand name and relative THC content than …

In most discussions of the nuclear deal, the word "Iraq" never comes up. That’s insane.

I have a fantasy. It’s that every politician and pundit who goes on TV to discuss the Iran deal is asked this question first: “Did you support the Iraq War, and how has that experience informed your position?”

George Osborne (Calling all progressives: help us reform the welfare state, 20 July) challenges Labour to support or oppose his welfare reforms. This is only the most recent example of the skill with which the Conservatives in government have set the terms of political debate. Hence, before the …

Are you a boss, or do you want to be one? In America, we often forget that we, the people, are the bosses. As is asserted in the Declaration of Independence, our style of government derives its "just powers from the consent of the governed." We hire politicians: Elections. We pay politicians: Tax …

When I arrived in the US just after New Year's Day in 1999, I didn't think I would stay. I came here for school and fully expected to return to Malaysia after I was done. Except I didn't. I met my future husband, found new friends, stumbled onto an exciting career and I knew, deep in my heart, that …